Going to Portland, Maine today. Yay! Early flight, 7 am, so that we’ll have a nice two hour layover before the connecting flight from Newark.

Up at 4:30. Cab called at 5. Cab to be there in 15 minutes!

Cab does not arrive. Call dispatcher. Dispatcher is evasive, yet concerned. Says cab driver is not far and is on the way.

Call again, this time 45 minutes later. Cab is “right there” and is in fact 30 minutes out.

Cab driver is a gentleman of retirement age from the Near East who is out of place here.

Cab is a minivan but inexplicably has been set up with a tiny trunk. Trunk already has several miscellaneous small boxes in it, which have to be moved for our two carry on sized bags.

Arriving at the airport, cab driver almost takes the route back out to the freeway instead of the one marked “All arrivals and departures.” When informed of this, he freezes up for a good 30 seconds and then nearly clips the center divider swerving over.

Pulling up at the terminal, the cab driver cuts off and nearly smashes another car, and then remains in the lane instead of pulling to the curb. causing the deputy sheriffs in charge to yell at him.

Entering the terminal, I discover that I somehow left the boarding passes in the cab. I place my mother in the check-in line and reprint the boarding passes.

We reach the front of the line only to discover that they’re not taking any more checked luggage for this flight. Would have been great to know that beforehand, because there’s a security checkpoint line and we are now way past the time we should have been at the gate.

At this point the odds are terrible. The probability of failure hits 1 when I discover that I cannot find my drivers license and therefore cannot satisfy the demands of the State to board an airplane. I leave my mother in line and tell her to fly without me if I don’t show.

A search begins for the ID, in various pockets and bits of bag, at the station where I couldn’t check in, at the machine where I printed the passes, on the floor, on the ceiling, through the pineal gland’s radiant vortex into Dimension 23. I hear my name called; some kind person has found my ID.

By now I have decisively missed the flight. However, a really nice TSA lady tells me to just come through and she’ll expedite me and see if I can catch the flight.

Nope. Because the day left the reasonable universe, I have also somehow lost the second boarding pass. I head to the thing that prints the passes, hoping against hope. It refuses to give me a pass because it’s too late.

At this point I notice that I have lost my phone. This means that I cannot contact my traveling partner, call the airline, call the people we’re visiting, or look anything up. I fire up the laptop to “Find My iPhone” but the airport wifi is clearly broken. It will not even connect to the thing that makes you do dumb things to connect.

I am now resigned. United Airlines holds the key to saving this day. Though they slay me, yet will I trust in them.

No way is anyone getting to Maine from Orange County now. I am booked on a redeye that will leave tonight and arrive there at 10 am tomorrow.

I take a much nice cab home and call my phone. A nice woman named Christina calls and says she’ll give it to lost and found.